


I Know Something About Love

by deathishauntedbyhumans



Category: The Adventures of Puss in Boots (Cartoon)
Genre: Eames exists but I’m not including him in the characters on principle, F/M, Found Family, Friendship/Love, Gen, Relationship Discussions, Wordcount: 100-1.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-09
Updated: 2019-03-09
Packaged: 2019-11-14 05:03:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18046022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathishauntedbyhumans/pseuds/deathishauntedbyhumans
Summary: Vina offers relationship advice to the Duchess in the only way she knows how.





	I Know Something About Love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kaennar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaennar/gifts).



> What’s up i’m Kris i’m 21 and i can’t fuckin write PiB fic without playing around with my DAUGHTER Vina
> 
> For riva1argentica, who asked if I was writing an Archess fic after we came up with the ship name and who inspired me to,,, actually write (a semblance of) some Archess fic. 
> 
> Title taken shamelessly from the song _Tell Him_ by Linda Ronstadt (or if you’e me, the _Strange Magic_ version of the song with Meredith Anne Bull singing ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

The Duchess sits at the table in the main room of the downstairs in the orphanage, eyes closed. She’s not sure if she can really call what she’s doing meditating, though.

On the contrary, it actually feels almost exactly like the _opposite_ of what her father had always told her meditation was like. Instead of feeling at one with herself, and her place in the universe, she feels... small. So, so small. She can hear the vague creaking of the ceiling above her, where the children are playing, and the sound of someone whinging pathetically outside. (She assumes it to be Eames, and then immediately curses herself for even bothering to pay him any attention at all.) Meditation is a moot point, she decides a few minutes into the task, when the town she now lives in is so unerringly _loud._

With a sigh, the Duchess opens her eyes again and comes face to face with a curious-looking Vina, who has somehow crept down the stairs without making a sound.

“Oh!!” The Duchess startles in her seat and flails for a good moment before she finds her feet (well, her foot, at least) underneath her and stills. “Vina! You scared the daylights out of me, girl.”

Vina hums her acknowledgement with a distracted frown on her face. The Duchess… doesn’t like that look. No, that’s not right. She doesn’t hate it, but it _unnerves_ her a quite a bit.

“Did you know that Artephius _liiikes_ you?” Vina asks out of nowhere without giving any hint of a smile. She’s still frowning in that strange look of concentration, and the the Duchess feels awfully, oddly vulnerable.

Shifting in her seat, the Duchess shakes her head slowly. “Artie doesn’t know how he feels about me,” she tells Vina, and she hopes it doesn’t come out as bitter as she feels. Artephius… Oh, she _loves_ him, but he is such an _idiot!_ He makes her so angry sometimes, acting like nothing’s the matter when _everything_ is the matter and pretending like the world is all sunshine and rainbows and _simplicity._

Vina climbs into the chair across from the Duchess, setting her elbows on the table and leaning forward. Her eyes are as wide as saucers, now, the frown gone in a flash, to be replaced with this sudden childlike vehemence that the Duchess barely understands.

“ _No_ ,” Vina says softly, the word drawn out and ending with an upward inflection in the child’s own dramatic fashion. “Artephius _likes_ you, Duchess. Did you know that he even talks about you when you are not around?”

“I doubt it,” the Duchess murmurs, more to herself than to Vina. Her relationship with Artephius is more complicated than any of the children can possibly understand.

“Duchess.”

There’s something about the way Vina says her name, though, and the stoic way she’s staring. The Duchess feels herself leaning forward, too, compelled by some sort of magic stronger than anything she’s ever known before. It feels very much like Vina is sharing a secret, something between two friends, two…

Two members of a _family._

And _this_ dawns on the Duchess like a revelation that she should have known before. It hits her the same way the memories of her sisters had upon getting them back, the same way the memories of her father slam her without warning when she experiences things that trigger her mind into recalling them. Once the thought is there, it feels like it’s always been meant to be there.

Vina is talking to her like this, _about_ this, because… they are a _family._

“Did you know that Artephius is in love with you?” It’s not a whisper, because even when Vina whispers, it’s never as quiet as it should be. But it’s _soft, vulnerable._ The Duchess feels her heart crack and melt and break and heal, all in one fell swoop.

“Oh,” she breathes out. She hardly registers moving, hardly registers standing up and hugging Vina tightly. She hardly registers anything at all, until Vina wiggles free of the Duchess’ restraining arms and looks up at her.

“Did you know that you are crying?” she asks, and the Duchess brings a hand to her cheek. It comes away wet, and she laughs a wet laugh and smiles through her tears.

“Thank you, Vina,” she says, and Vina cocks her head to the side. She takes a moment, and then a slow smile breaks out along her thin lips.

“Did you know that you should go and talk to Artephius now?”

The Duchess laughs again, hands flapping a little at the sides of her own head. She needs… she needs to go talk to Artie. She needs to… stop crying, and talk to Artie, because she has something _very_ important to say to him.

Vina nudges her, the smile on her face turning sly in a way that only child’s faces can possibly pull off. “Go onnnn!”

The Duchess pats Vina fondly on the head as she nods her own. By the time she reaches the door and glances back, Vina is already darting back up the stairs to the second floor of the orphanage, no doubt back to the rest of the children.

The rest of her _family_.

With a soft smile she doesn’t try to hide, the Duchess slips out of the orphanage, glances around for any sight of her wayward alchemist, and then heads towards Artephius’ shop with a single-minded determination that not even Eames’ pitiful groaning from somewhere near the Cantina can shake.

**Author's Note:**

> Hmmmmmmm
> 
> Sometimes I feel bad for anyone subscribed to me on this dang website, bc I,,, just write everything and there is Nobody who cares for all the things I yell about. Oh well ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> Kudos/comments are love! Come scream at me on tumblr @deathishauntedbyhumans


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